Matthew Gill

Business and Management, Corporate Governance and Accountability, Finance, Accounting, and Banking

Accounting is the language of business, increasingly standardized across the world through global banks and corporations: a technical tool used to reach the correct, unquestionable answer. ...
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Accounting is the language of business, increasingly standardized across the world through global banks and corporations: a technical tool used to reach the correct, unquestionable answer. Nonetheless, as recent corporate scandals have shown, a whole range of financial professionals (accountants, auditors, bankers, finance directors) can collectively fail to question dubious actions. How is this possible? To understand such failures, this book explores how accountants construct the technical knowledge they deem relevant to decision-making. In doing so, it not only offers a new way to understand deviance and scandals, but also suggests a reappraisal of accounting knowledge which has important implications for everyday commercial life. The book's findings are based on interviews with chartered accountants working in the largest accountancy practices in London. The interviews reveal that although accounting decisions seem clear after they have been made, the process of making them is contested and opaque. Yet accountants nonetheless tend to describe their work as if it were straightforward and technical. This book delves beneath the surface to explore how accountants actually construct knowledge, and draws out the implications of that process with respect to issues such as professionalism, performance, transparency, and ethics. This thought-provoking book concludes that accountants' technical discourse undermines their ethical reasoning by obscuring the ways in which accounting decisions must be thought through in practice. Accountants with particular ethical perspectives more readily understand and construct particular types of knowledge, so the two issues of knowledge and of ethics are inseparable. Increasingly technical accounting rules can therefore be counterproductive. Instead, this book shows how reinvigorating the ethical discourse within the financial world could be a more effective means of averting future scandals.Less

Accountants' Truth : Knowledge and Ethics in the Financial World

Matthew Gill

Published in print: 2009-06-25

Accounting is the language of business, increasingly standardized across the world through global banks and corporations: a technical tool used to reach the correct, unquestionable answer. Nonetheless, as recent corporate scandals have shown, a whole range of financial professionals (accountants, auditors, bankers, finance directors) can collectively fail to question dubious actions. How is this possible? To understand such failures, this book explores how accountants construct the technical knowledge they deem relevant to decision-making. In doing so, it not only offers a new way to understand deviance and scandals, but also suggests a reappraisal of accounting knowledge which has important implications for everyday commercial life. The book's findings are based on interviews with chartered accountants working in the largest accountancy practices in London. The interviews reveal that although accounting decisions seem clear after they have been made, the process of making them is contested and opaque. Yet accountants nonetheless tend to describe their work as if it were straightforward and technical. This book delves beneath the surface to explore how accountants actually construct knowledge, and draws out the implications of that process with respect to issues such as professionalism, performance, transparency, and ethics. This thought-provoking book concludes that accountants' technical discourse undermines their ethical reasoning by obscuring the ways in which accounting decisions must be thought through in practice. Accountants with particular ethical perspectives more readily understand and construct particular types of knowledge, so the two issues of knowledge and of ethics are inseparable. Increasingly technical accounting rules can therefore be counterproductive. Instead, this book shows how reinvigorating the ethical discourse within the financial world could be a more effective means of averting future scandals.

Christopher S. Chapman, David J. Cooper, and Peter Miller (eds)

Business and Management, Organization Studies, Finance, Accounting, and Banking

Accounting has an ever-increasing significance in contemporary society. Indeed, some argue that its practices are fundamental to the development and functioning of modern capitalist societies. We can ...
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Accounting has an ever-increasing significance in contemporary society. Indeed, some argue that its practices are fundamental to the development and functioning of modern capitalist societies. We can see accounting everywhere: in organizations where budgeting, investing, costing, and performance appraisal rely on accounting practices; in financial and other audits; in corporate scandals and financial reporting and regulation; in corporate governance, risk management, and accountability, and in the corresponding growth and influence of the accounting profession. Accounting, too, is an important part of the curriculum and research of business and management schools, the fastest growing sector in higher education. This growth is largely a phenomenon of the last fifty years or so. Prior to that, accounting was seen mainly as a mundane, technical, bookkeeping exercise (and some still share that naive view). The growth in accounting has demanded a corresponding engagement by scholars to examine and highlight the important behavioural, organizational, institutional, and social dimensions of accounting. Pioneering work by accounting researchers and social scientists more generally has persuasively demonstrated to a wider social science, professional, management, and policy audience how many aspects of life are indeed constituted, to an important extent, through the calculative practices of accounting. Anthony Hopwood, to whom this books is dedicated, has been a leading figure in this endeavour, which has effectively defined accounting as a distinctive field of research in the social sciences. The book brings together the work of leading international accounting academics and social scientists, and demonstrates the scope, vitality, and insights of contemporary scholarship in and on accounting and auditing.Less

Published in print: 2009-08-13

Accounting has an ever-increasing significance in contemporary society. Indeed, some argue that its practices are fundamental to the development and functioning of modern capitalist societies. We can see accounting everywhere: in organizations where budgeting, investing, costing, and performance appraisal rely on accounting practices; in financial and other audits; in corporate scandals and financial reporting and regulation; in corporate governance, risk management, and accountability, and in the corresponding growth and influence of the accounting profession. Accounting, too, is an important part of the curriculum and research of business and management schools, the fastest growing sector in higher education. This growth is largely a phenomenon of the last fifty years or so. Prior to that, accounting was seen mainly as a mundane, technical, bookkeeping exercise (and some still share that naive view). The growth in accounting has demanded a corresponding engagement by scholars to examine and highlight the important behavioural, organizational, institutional, and social dimensions of accounting. Pioneering work by accounting researchers and social scientists more generally has persuasively demonstrated to a wider social science, professional, management, and policy audience how many aspects of life are indeed constituted, to an important extent, through the calculative practices of accounting. Anthony Hopwood, to whom this books is dedicated, has been a leading figure in this endeavour, which has effectively defined accounting as a distinctive field of research in the social sciences. The book brings together the work of leading international accounting academics and social scientists, and demonstrates the scope, vitality, and insights of contemporary scholarship in and on accounting and auditing.

This book considers how the sales function informs business strategy. There are many books that address how to manage the sales team tactically, however, this text addresses how sales can help ...
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This book considers how the sales function informs business strategy. There are many books that address how to manage the sales team tactically, however, this text addresses how sales can help organizations to become more customer-oriented. Many organizations are facing escalating costs and growing customer power, making it necessary to allocate resources more strategically. The sales function can provide critical customer and market knowledge to help inform both innovation and marketing. Sales build customer knowledge; network both internally and externally to create additional customer value; and manage customer relationships and selling. The text considers how sales organizations are responding to increasing competition, more demanding customers, and a more complex selling environment. Possible solutions to the many challenges facing organizations are discussed. The book considers the changing nature of sales and how activities can be aligned within the organization, as well as market-sensing, creating customer focus, and the role of sales leadership. Short case studies by a range of organizations operating in various industries are provided. Sales and senior management play an important role in ensuring sales teams’ activities are aligned to business strategy and in creating an environment that allows salespeople to successfully new business opportunities and build long-term profitable business relationships. The book also considers how academic sales literature has changed in the last five years and integrates it with examples from sales practice to provide a more complete picture of the role of sales within the modern organization.Less

Kenneth Le Meunier-FitzHughTony Douglas

Published in print: 2016-06-01

This book considers how the sales function informs business strategy. There are many books that address how to manage the sales team tactically, however, this text addresses how sales can help organizations to become more customer-oriented. Many organizations are facing escalating costs and growing customer power, making it necessary to allocate resources more strategically. The sales function can provide critical customer and market knowledge to help inform both innovation and marketing. Sales build customer knowledge; network both internally and externally to create additional customer value; and manage customer relationships and selling. The text considers how sales organizations are responding to increasing competition, more demanding customers, and a more complex selling environment. Possible solutions to the many challenges facing organizations are discussed. The book considers the changing nature of sales and how activities can be aligned within the organization, as well as market-sensing, creating customer focus, and the role of sales leadership. Short case studies by a range of organizations operating in various industries are provided. Sales and senior management play an important role in ensuring sales teams’ activities are aligned to business strategy and in creating an environment that allows salespeople to successfully new business opportunities and build long-term profitable business relationships. The book also considers how academic sales literature has changed in the last five years and integrates it with examples from sales practice to provide a more complete picture of the role of sales within the modern organization.

Business and Management, Finance, Accounting, and Banking, Political Economy

This book addresses two important questions: first, why did financial innovation lead to the crisis in the banking sector that developed in 2007–8; and, second, why the political reform of finance ...
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This book addresses two important questions: first, why did financial innovation lead to the crisis in the banking sector that developed in 2007–8; and, second, why the political reform of finance has apparently proved so difficult across a variety of political jurisdictions? This ambitious book draws on a team of researchers from different disciplines to develop an innovation and distinctive argument in response to these two critical issues. In the first half of this book our question is about how crisis was generated. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 develop our answer, which is that innovation in and around the financial markets took the form of bricolage which did not consider the risks, uncertainty, and unintended consequences of volume-based business models and complex circuits. The direct implication is that finance needs to be simplified, rather than regulation made more sophisticated. In the second half of the book, our question is about why democratic political control both before and after the crisis has proved so difficult? Chapters 5, 6, and 7 develop our answer, which is that self-serving financial elites are not easily controlled by technocratic elites who are themselves recovering from knowledge failure, or by the rest of the governing classes concerned with political positioning for electoral advantage on issues which are technical, opaque, and illegible to the electorate at large. In Chapter 8, we discuss some of the implications of this analysis for how reform of both banking regulation and democracy is required.Less

After the Great Complacence : Financial Crisis and the Politics of Reform

Published in print: 2011-09-01

This book addresses two important questions: first, why did financial innovation lead to the crisis in the banking sector that developed in 2007–8; and, second, why the political reform of finance has apparently proved so difficult across a variety of political jurisdictions? This ambitious book draws on a team of researchers from different disciplines to develop an innovation and distinctive argument in response to these two critical issues. In the first half of this book our question is about how crisis was generated. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 develop our answer, which is that innovation in and around the financial markets took the form of bricolage which did not consider the risks, uncertainty, and unintended consequences of volume-based business models and complex circuits. The direct implication is that finance needs to be simplified, rather than regulation made more sophisticated. In the second half of the book, our question is about why democratic political control both before and after the crisis has proved so difficult? Chapters 5, 6, and 7 develop our answer, which is that self-serving financial elites are not easily controlled by technocratic elites who are themselves recovering from knowledge failure, or by the rest of the governing classes concerned with political positioning for electoral advantage on issues which are technical, opaque, and illegible to the electorate at large. In Chapter 8, we discuss some of the implications of this analysis for how reform of both banking regulation and democracy is required.

This book focuses on the transition faced by business organizations and their stakeholders as they move from protected markets to open competition, and it explores how these changes can be ...
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This book focuses on the transition faced by business organizations and their stakeholders as they move from protected markets to open competition, and it explores how these changes can be facilitated by outside interveners/agents. Centering on four case studies — AT&T, Lucent, Electricité de France, and the Italian State Railways — the book analyses the approach to intervention, the problems created by existing systems of stakeholder dialogue, and the prospects for change. It draws two fundamental lessons. Firstly, that intervention in these situations must be broad and involving — a ‘full engagement’ approach — in order to achieve changes in relations and identities among a range of players. The book explores the key elements and practical techniques of this approach. Secondly, that the issues ultimately go beyond improving union-management relations or organizational structures; even in the best cases, the players have been unable to reach stable agreements in the face of continuing pressures for change. A deep transformation of the system of stakeholder relations is required — the creation of a system of ‘post-industrial relations’. The book includes discussion of managerial problems and intervention strategies in an ever more responsive and flexible economy, and also the implications for democracy in the work-place and the future of union representation. The book is valuable for consultants, unionists, managers, and public policy makers, and accessible also to students and the interested public.Less

Agents of Change : Crossing the Post-Industrial Divide

Charles HeckscherMichael MaccobyRafael RamirezPierre-Eric Tixier

Published in print: 2003-03-20

This book focuses on the transition faced by business organizations and their stakeholders as they move from protected markets to open competition, and it explores how these changes can be facilitated by outside interveners/agents. Centering on four case studies — AT&T, Lucent, Electricité de France, and the Italian State Railways — the book analyses the approach to intervention, the problems created by existing systems of stakeholder dialogue, and the prospects for change. It draws two fundamental lessons. Firstly, that intervention in these situations must be broad and involving — a ‘full engagement’ approach — in order to achieve changes in relations and identities among a range of players. The book explores the key elements and practical techniques of this approach. Secondly, that the issues ultimately go beyond improving union-management relations or organizational structures; even in the best cases, the players have been unable to reach stable agreements in the face of continuing pressures for change. A deep transformation of the system of stakeholder relations is required — the creation of a system of ‘post-industrial relations’. The book includes discussion of managerial problems and intervention strategies in an ever more responsive and flexible economy, and also the implications for democracy in the work-place and the future of union representation. The book is valuable for consultants, unionists, managers, and public policy makers, and accessible also to students and the interested public.

Kees Camfferman and Stephen A. Zeff

Business and Management, Finance, Accounting, and Banking, International Business

This book provides a historical study of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) from 2001 to 2011. During this period, the IASB and its International Financial Reporting Standards ...
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This book provides a historical study of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) from 2001 to 2011. During this period, the IASB and its International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs) acquired a central position in the practice and regulation of financial reporting around the world. As a unique instance of a private-sector body setting standards with legal force in many jurisdictions, the IASB’s rise to prominence has been accompanied by vivid political debates about its governance and accountability. Similarly, the IASB’s often innovative attempts to change the face of financial reporting have made it the centre of numerous controversies. The book traces the history of the IASB from its foundation as successor to the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC), and discusses its operation, changing membership and leadership, the development of its standards, and their reception in jurisdictions around the world. The book gives particular attention to the IASB’s relationships with the European Union, the United States, and Japan, as well as to the impact of the financial crisis on the IASB’s work.Less

Kees CamffermanStephen A. Zeff

Published in print: 2015-03-01

This book provides a historical study of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) from 2001 to 2011. During this period, the IASB and its International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs) acquired a central position in the practice and regulation of financial reporting around the world. As a unique instance of a private-sector body setting standards with legal force in many jurisdictions, the IASB’s rise to prominence has been accompanied by vivid political debates about its governance and accountability. Similarly, the IASB’s often innovative attempts to change the face of financial reporting have made it the centre of numerous controversies. The book traces the history of the IASB from its foundation as successor to the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC), and discusses its operation, changing membership and leadership, the development of its standards, and their reception in jurisdictions around the world. The book gives particular attention to the IASB’s relationships with the European Union, the United States, and Japan, as well as to the impact of the financial crisis on the IASB’s work.

In Aligning for Advantage, it is argued that to deliver successfully on a company’s overarching purpose and intent, competitive strategy needs to be synchronized with strategies for political and ...
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In Aligning for Advantage, it is argued that to deliver successfully on a company’s overarching purpose and intent, competitive strategy needs to be synchronized with strategies for political and regulatory activism and social and environmental engagement. Moreover, these market and nonmarket strategies must be equally attuned with, and informed by, the corporate vision, values, and objectives. The ability to align with and across both the market and the nonmarket is a key determinant of competitive advantage in a multipolar world economy. A managerial process and a conceptual framework are advanced for aligning a company’s business objectives and market positions with its political requirements and social obligations. Strategic alignment is a pragmatic and proactive approach for modern enterprises to engage with the forces and events affecting their business choices and actions at home and abroad. Companies must strive for a balanced and mutually reinforcing approach to corporate strategy, political activity, and social responsibility. In some cases, alignment may mean deep, strategically embedded partnerships with governments, NGOs, or other stakeholders. In others, alignment may consist of looser, more ad hoc collaborations with outside organizations and institutions. Whatever the approach, the relationship between nonmarket and market strategies should be conscious and deliberate, not accidental or artificially constructed. Truly aligned strategies seek to reconcile and modulate the sometimes conflicting external demands that a company encounters in a way that is appropriate for the firm’s geographic and market positions, while at the same time leveraging the overall nonmarket strategy as a source of competitive advantage.Less

Aligning for Advantage : Competitive Strategies for the Political and Social Arenas

Thomas C. LawtonJonathan P. DohTazeeb Rajwani

Published in print: 2014-02-27

In Aligning for Advantage, it is argued that to deliver successfully on a company’s overarching purpose and intent, competitive strategy needs to be synchronized with strategies for political and regulatory activism and social and environmental engagement. Moreover, these market and nonmarket strategies must be equally attuned with, and informed by, the corporate vision, values, and objectives. The ability to align with and across both the market and the nonmarket is a key determinant of competitive advantage in a multipolar world economy. A managerial process and a conceptual framework are advanced for aligning a company’s business objectives and market positions with its political requirements and social obligations. Strategic alignment is a pragmatic and proactive approach for modern enterprises to engage with the forces and events affecting their business choices and actions at home and abroad. Companies must strive for a balanced and mutually reinforcing approach to corporate strategy, political activity, and social responsibility. In some cases, alignment may mean deep, strategically embedded partnerships with governments, NGOs, or other stakeholders. In others, alignment may consist of looser, more ad hoc collaborations with outside organizations and institutions. Whatever the approach, the relationship between nonmarket and market strategies should be conscious and deliberate, not accidental or artificially constructed. Truly aligned strategies seek to reconcile and modulate the sometimes conflicting external demands that a company encounters in a way that is appropriate for the firm’s geographic and market positions, while at the same time leveraging the overall nonmarket strategy as a source of competitive advantage.

The way we work is changing. New information and communication technologies (ICTs) have enabled new forms of work organization—necessitating new ways to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate on ...
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The way we work is changing. New information and communication technologies (ICTs) have enabled new forms of work organization—necessitating new ways to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate on work. So, increasingly, we find ourselves working in temporary, loosely organized, specialist-heavy, project-oriented teams—all-edge adhocracies. And these adhocracies work very differently from bureaucratic hierarchies, which organized us throughout the 20th century. They have different strengths, weaknesses, and possibilities. This book examines different aspects of all-edge adhocracies: why they are needed, how they emerged, how they are structured, how they develop, how they interact with other kinds of work organization, and what they need to thrive. Throughout, the book grounds its discussion in case studies of all-edge adhocracies at work, helping readers to understand and apply the principles to their own organizations.Less

All Edge : Inside the New Workplace Networks

Clay Spinuzzi

Published in print: 2015-03-17

The way we work is changing. New information and communication technologies (ICTs) have enabled new forms of work organization—necessitating new ways to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate on work. So, increasingly, we find ourselves working in temporary, loosely organized, specialist-heavy, project-oriented teams—all-edge adhocracies. And these adhocracies work very differently from bureaucratic hierarchies, which organized us throughout the 20th century. They have different strengths, weaknesses, and possibilities. This book examines different aspects of all-edge adhocracies: why they are needed, how they emerged, how they are structured, how they develop, how they interact with other kinds of work organization, and what they need to thrive. Throughout, the book grounds its discussion in case studies of all-edge adhocracies at work, helping readers to understand and apply the principles to their own organizations.

The United States has a large number of well-educated, experienced professional women ready, willing, and able to move into the boardrooms and executive suites of corporate America. They represent a ...
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The United States has a large number of well-educated, experienced professional women ready, willing, and able to move into the boardrooms and executive suites of corporate America. They represent a great, untapped economic resource and this book argues that this is America’s competitive secret. Drawing on in-depth interviews with top executives and middle managers, and the latest research on working women and organizational change, the author describes the unique contribution of female professionals. Her profiles of top women managers reveal that they cope well with ambiguity, are comfortable sharing power, and tend to empower others' leadership traits that lead to increased employee productivity, innovation, and profits. The book offers evidence that the changes that help organizations more fully utilize the talents of women are the same changes that will give them an important edge in today’s global workplace. The author explains why the glass ceiling still prevents many competent women from reaching the upper echelons of management. She analyses why women and men are perceived and evaluated differently at work, and provides new insight into the feelings of men who are asked to interact with women in new roles when there are few new rules. The book shows that removing the glass ceiling can no longer be viewed solely in terms of social equity—it is now an economic imperative.Less

America’s Competitive Secret : Women Managers

Judy B. Rosener

Published in print: 1998-03-05

The United States has a large number of well-educated, experienced professional women ready, willing, and able to move into the boardrooms and executive suites of corporate America. They represent a great, untapped economic resource and this book argues that this is America’s competitive secret. Drawing on in-depth interviews with top executives and middle managers, and the latest research on working women and organizational change, the author describes the unique contribution of female professionals. Her profiles of top women managers reveal that they cope well with ambiguity, are comfortable sharing power, and tend to empower others' leadership traits that lead to increased employee productivity, innovation, and profits. The book offers evidence that the changes that help organizations more fully utilize the talents of women are the same changes that will give them an important edge in today’s global workplace. The author explains why the glass ceiling still prevents many competent women from reaching the upper echelons of management. She analyses why women and men are perceived and evaluated differently at work, and provides new insight into the feelings of men who are asked to interact with women in new roles when there are few new rules. The book shows that removing the glass ceiling can no longer be viewed solely in terms of social equity—it is now an economic imperative.

This book addresses some of the major contemporary issues in comparative business and employment relations. At its core are the findings of a four-year international exploration of the management of ...
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This book addresses some of the major contemporary issues in comparative business and employment relations. At its core are the findings of a four-year international exploration of the management of employment relations in American multinational companies in the UK, Germany, Ireland, and Spain. Data from detailed case studies are used to illuminate the tensions between the forces of globalization and the continuing distinctiveness of national business systems. It looks at what is distinctively American about US multinationals, asking how the US business system’s particular features influence their management of human resources across national borders. It shows that the transfer of ‘Americanness’ is not a technical, top-down, managerial process, but a highly political and ‘negotiated’ one in which groups and individuals at different levels within the company try to influence the terms of transfer. The book uses a wealth of empirical material to explore the ways in which US multinationals manage international employment relations in different host countries. Four areas of policy and practice are considered in detail: pay and performance; collective employee representation; the management of workforce ‘diversity’; and managerial careers. It shows how global HR policies are made; how they are diffused internationally; and how they are adopted, adapted, or resisted by overseas subsidiaries. It also explores some of the structures and processes that characterize US multinationals: the changing balance between centralization and subsidiary autonomy; the management of international learning; and the structure and role of the international human resource function.Less

American Multinationals in Europe : Managing Employment Relations Across National Borders

Published in print: 2006-07-20

This book addresses some of the major contemporary issues in comparative business and employment relations. At its core are the findings of a four-year international exploration of the management of employment relations in American multinational companies in the UK, Germany, Ireland, and Spain. Data from detailed case studies are used to illuminate the tensions between the forces of globalization and the continuing distinctiveness of national business systems. It looks at what is distinctively American about US multinationals, asking how the US business system’s particular features influence their management of human resources across national borders. It shows that the transfer of ‘Americanness’ is not a technical, top-down, managerial process, but a highly political and ‘negotiated’ one in which groups and individuals at different levels within the company try to influence the terms of transfer. The book uses a wealth of empirical material to explore the ways in which US multinationals manage international employment relations in different host countries. Four areas of policy and practice are considered in detail: pay and performance; collective employee representation; the management of workforce ‘diversity’; and managerial careers. It shows how global HR policies are made; how they are diffused internationally; and how they are adopted, adapted, or resisted by overseas subsidiaries. It also explores some of the structures and processes that characterize US multinationals: the changing balance between centralization and subsidiary autonomy; the management of international learning; and the structure and role of the international human resource function.